Author's Note:

This fic was a special request from Rose0, who has been so wonderful. I hope you all enjoy!

Chapter 1 - Taking (Another) Break

Everything was worse after Heaven. Castiel was despondent, upset by the knowledge that his Father was staying deliberately uninvolved. Dean was sort of wading through life, not really putting in a lot of effort into his actions. Both of them had essentially given up on everything. Sam couldn't think of a way to help either one of them, not that either was looking for his help, so he stayed quiet and avoided them both.

It was easier to avoid Castiel, because the angel was rarely around anyway. Dean, on the other hand, was always around. They had always lived in each other's pockets, but it hadn't been this uncomfortable since before their break after Sam had killed Lilith. Things had slowly gotten better after they met up again, but of course it couldn't last. Maybe if they had come back right away, but instead they'd gotten a tour around Heaven itself. Sam knew that he should be relieved he'd even gone to Heaven in the first place, but he had found the experience unsettling. Nothing felt right about the entire adventure, but Sam wondered if that hadn't been the point all along. Maybe his tainted blood had screwed up the process that figured out your best memories, and that was why everything had been so uncomfortable. Whatever the case, the end result had been Dean losing his faith.

Sam knew that Dean had lost faith in general, not just in him, but he couldn't help but take his brother's lapse into hopelessness personally. After all, Dean hadn't just thrown away their chance to find God, but the symbol of his and Sam's relationship since childhood. Sam now had it in his jacket pocket. He didn't dare wear it, not wanting to set his brother off, but he clung to it as a reminder of what he'd lost. Maybe it could help him find a way to make it right.

If that latest development wasn't bad enough, they still had an apocalypse to handle, and that was getting harder to manage every day. Of course, that was a secret Sam was keeping from Dean. If Dean knew how bad Sam's night visits from Lucifer were, or that he was having them at all, it wouldn't end well. So instead, Sam took sleep medication that knocked him out and kept him out. That way, he may have been trapped in the nightmares Lucifer sent to get him to say yes, but at least he wouldn't scream out loud. Dean didn't need something else to worry about.

Lucifer occasionally visited during the day in pseudo-visions that Sam found disturbing, but he'd found a way to cope with those too. He'd taken to carrying a razor blade in his wallet, taking a moment to add to the neat lines across his arm whenever the pressure was too much. It wasn't a perfect solution, but it was something that helped him manage what he had to live with. He made sure the scars were high enough on his arm that they couldn't be seen if his jacket happened to ride up. Dean would probably take issue with him cutting himself, but Sam knew his brother wouldn't understand the purpose of the exercise. It wasn't a conversation he wanted to have.

One brother had given up, and one was barely functioning under the weight of the devil. They were supposed to save the world? Sam sometimes doubted that they'd be able to save themselves. He was the one still fighting though, albeit poorly, so he put on a brave face and did his best to keep Dean moving. It was clear that his brother thought Sam didn't want to be around him, but Sam was going to ensure that he wasn't an additional strain on Dean. He would be the best support he could be, and help Dean regain enough faith to stop the devil. In the end, that was all he could do.

Everything fell apart after the simplest hunt they could have taken. It hadn't even been the hunt they were heading towards. Sam had picked up some information during a stop for gas along their route that pointed to a local haunting. As he told Dean, it couldn't hurt to take care of it, since they were already in town. His brother had reluctantly agreed, and they'd done the necessary research to identify the spirit. Once they'd found her, they headed to the cemetery and burned the body. Open and shut, or so it seemed. They never did get off easy, after all. The spirit came after them as soon as they lit the fire, knocking Sam over with an invisible force and rushing towards Dean. Sam was dazed from a knock on a tombstone, and unable to get up.

Dean ended up pinned against a tree, struggling for breath against the force the spirit was using to constrict his airways. He couldn't reach any weapons, and was fighting uselessly.

Sam made a desperate grab for the shotgun, still unable to stand, and swung it around, firing at the spirit. He caught her, but it wasn't a clean shot, and some of the projectile rock salt struck Dean's leg full force.

"AGH! Dammit!" Dean swore as he fell to the ground, the spirit vanishing for the moment.

Sam tried to rise, clutching at his head as he did so, but he couldn't get his legs under him just yet. A glance at his hand confirmed that the head wound was bleeding, but he ignored it for the moment. "Are you okay?" He called out. The fact that Dean could swear probably meant he was all right, but he had to be sure.

Dean rose slowly, limping towards Sam with a thunderous expression on his face. "Just peachy," he snapped. "What's the bitch attached to?"

Sam winced as he managed to finally stand, using a tombstone for support. "I dunno," he admitted. "Probably something in the house somewhere. There wasn't anything in the research to indicate-"

"Well there damn well should have been," Dean snapped, rubbing absently at the leg Sam had caught with the rock salt. He wasn't putting any weight on it. "We need to go check out the house, and you need to get something on that head. I don't want blood on the seats."

Sam figured that was about as much concern as he was going to get, but that was fine. If anything, Dean's reaction told him that the head wound wasn't as serious as it could have been. He put his hand to it again to apply pressure and using his other hand to grab the supply bag, stumbling after his brother towards the car.

In the end, the spirit had been attached to an heirloom necklace. Dean had been the one to destroy it while Sam stood guard, and they thankfully avoided another run in with the spirit herself. Satisfied that the job was done, they headed to the local motel. They hadn't booked a room before, not expecting to be in town that long, but Dean didn't want to drive overnight after a hunt, and Sam was more than willing to sleep in a bed rather than the car. His head still throbbed, but at least it had stopped bleeding.

Finally in the room, Dean immediately stripped down to his boxer briefs and t-shirt, hefting his leg up onto the bed to examine it. He had what almost looked like road rash on most of his calf, but would probably be okay once it was cleaned out. He winced and applied some antibacterial cream to it, wrapping it gently in gauze so he wouldn't aggravate the wound in his sleep. His next step was to pull out on of their whisky bottles and pour himself a generous glass.

Sam knew better than to mention the alcohol, but he did address the injury from earlier. "Dean, look, I'm sorry I caught you with the shotgun spray. I just wanted to stop her choking you."

"Yeah, well, you did that," Dean acknowledged, taking a long swig of the whisky.

Letting it be, Sam headed for the bathroom, intending to clean out his head wound. It didn't look as bad as he'd imagined, and he was relieved that the largest part of the job was just cleaning blood out of his hair. It looked like he was going to have a nasty bruise though, and he wasn't sure if he was at risk for a concussion or not. He thought about asking Dean to check him for one, but decided it was best not to rock the boat.

When he emerged from the bathroom, Dean was already on his second glass of whisky. "Sam, sit," he ordered, gesturing to the chair across from his bed.

Sam sat, eyeing his brother warily. "What is it?"

"I need you to have my back, dude," Dean said tiredly. "I mean, it's one thing knowing that you don't want to be here, but when that means that you also can't do simple research right or your aim goes to crap, then we're both in danger, and that's just idiotic." He swished the glass and took another swig, his jaw hard.

Sam didn't argue, knowing that it wasn't going to do any good. The research and aim weren't technically his fault, but at the same time he had inadvertently been responsible for injuring both himself and Dean, which was definitely a risk. It was hard to focus on the small things when the large things were so much more important, and maybe Sam had lost sight of that. "I'm sorry," he said again, doing his best to express the sentiment with his expression as well as his words. "I swear, I will do better next time."

"Look..." Dean trailed off, closing his eyes and rubbing at his forehead with a sigh. He reopened his eyes and focused on Sam again. "At this point, I'm not sure we aren't doing more harm than good. I mean, sure, we gave the 'two of us against the world' thing a try, but I think we've got jack squat for it. You're distracted, and you're distracting me, and this isn't going to end well. I think, until all this apocalypse crap is over at least, we need to go at this from separate angles."

There was a long pause while Sam tried to figure out how to process that. He'd been doing his best to ensure that Dean didn't lose hope as well as faith, but maybe Dean had given up on him more than he had on the mission. If that was true, then Sam being with him was a hindrance to Dean stopping the apocalypse. He tried to consider the situation pragmatically. If Sam left, then he wouldn't be distracting Dean. If Dean wasn't distracted, he could focus on stopping Lucifer. Sam had assumed that Dean needed support to accomplish the mission, but maybe if he stepped back, Dean could rise up and take care of it himself.

"So, you want me to leave?" Sam asked as neutrally as possible, raising an eyebrow to show he was just clarifying the bottom line.

"Yeah, I think that's probably best for now." Dean rubbed at his leg absently and finished off his drink.

"Okay," Sam agreed, getting to his feet. An idea was starting to brew in his head, and he was starting to wonder if maybe this was for the best after all.

"Where you going to head?" Dean asked, looking surprised that Sam had agreed without a fight.

Sam shrugged, packing away what little he'd managed to unpack since they'd been in the room. "I'll figure it out once I'm on the road."

Dean seemed to realize Sam was packing and shook his head suddenly. "Wait, dude, you don't have to go tonight," he pointed out. "At least wait until morning."

Sam shook his head. "No, it's fine. I'll get a heard start on travel." On picking a different hemisphere, his brain supplied unhelpfully. "You need the rest more than I do. Don't stress that leg too much." He shrugged his jacket back on, patting the pocket on instinct to make sure the little bronze amulet was still there.

"You sure?" Dean checked, but was already laying back on the bed, supporting his leg gingerly.

"Yeah. Good luck, all right?" Sam gave his brother a half smile, tossing his bag over his shoulder.

"You too," Dean replied. "Take care of yourself."

Sam figured saying 'you too' again would be repetitive, so he just nodded and headed out the door. He was half inclined to steal a car from the parking lot, but that wasn't going to be his wisest move, and he didn't want to have to deal with law enforcement if he could help it. Hitch hiking it was then. His mission wasn't necessarily location specific, so he just needed to find a good home base to work from. Probably secluded, just in case.

Solving the Lucifer problem was Sam's responsibility. Stopping the apocalypse was Dean's, and Sam wasn't going to challenge that again, but there was one thing that only Sam could do, and that was deny Lucifer his vessel. The problem was, Lucifer wouldn't let him die. Originally, when he'd told Sam that, Sam had tested the theory. Several stereotypical methods of suicide hadn't worked, and Sam had some odd scars he'd had to find creative ways to hide from Dean when they met up again. Explaining a bullet wound over his heart wasn't exactly a conversation he wanted to have. The razor blade he'd made use of had helped with some of the panic he'd had after four attempts to end his life hadn't worked. Another secret he'd kept.

Now, he knew what his mission should be. Dean would focus on stopping Lucifer, but Sam would focus on removing himself from the equation. If Lucifer couldn't have his true vessel, eventually he'd burn out of his current one, or Dean would find a way to kill him, or something. Somehow, it would end. That was only if Sam kept himself off the playing field. He knew from his previous experimentation that his suicides only left him down for the count for a few hours, so it wasn't practical to just continually kill himself, even if he found a way to do that easily. Instead, he didn't a way to make his death permanent, so nobody could raise him, not even God. Actually, Sam wasn't sure what kind of limitations, if any, God had, but considering He didn't seem involved, Sam figured he probably didn't need to be worried.

Bobby would have been a good stop for the kind of lore Sam needed to look into, but Bobby was smart. He would figure out what Sam was doing, and he would object to it. He'd probably call Dean too, and Dean wouldn't be thrilled with the idea. Sam wasn't sure how hard he'd have to fight his brother to convince him of his point, but he figured it wasn't worth the effort to get either Dean or Bobby involved. An angel might know how to keep him dead, but Sam didn't have one to turn to who would help. Castiel would probably object just based on the fact that Dean probably wouldn't be happy about it. Sam felt a twinge of jealousy at that thought, as he always did when faced with the reality that Dean was the one the angels wanted, not Sam. There was always the archangel Gabriel, but Sam didn't think he could trust him to help. Any other angel Sam knew was invested in the success of the apocalypse, which meant Lucifer getting his true vessel.

There were always the demons, and Sam wanted to avoid them as long as possible. He may well have to consult with Hell eventually, but he would start with research. Somehow, he would find a way to stay dead. Until then, he would make do with staying off the grid.